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KD 47473(7-8)

HARVARD

COLLEGE

Oct 17. 1929

LIBRARY

Augustin H Harker

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IVE hundred years ago, a considerable part of France was under the rule of the kings of England. The manner in which the English gained possession of territories in that country is perhaps not very generally known. When William, Duke of Normandy, fixed by conquest his sway over England, he still retained his Norman possessions. These, with some other districts, descended as an heritage to the English crown, so that, in process of time, when the invasion of the Normans was forgotten, it almost appeared as if the English had intruded themselves into Normandy, instead of the Norman dukes having intruded themselves into England. With Normandy as a stronghold, the English monarchs contrived to extend their possessions in France by means of wars, for which it was always easy to find a pretext. Besides this odious practice, there was another means of extending kingdoms much resorted to in these times. This consisted in the intermarriage of princes and princesses. When the son of an English king married the daughter and heiress of a French duke, and when the duke died, his possessions, including all the people upon them, became, as a matter of course, the lawful patrimony of his daughter's family. Vast possessions, in what is now included under the name France, were thus added to the English crown. One of the most sweeping encroachments of this kind arose from the marriage of a daughter of Charles VI. of France to Henry V. of England. When Charles VI. died

No. 49.

I

(1422), the succession was settled on his son-in-law Henry, to the exclusion of a son, Charles—a man of weak dispositions. Henry V. died before he was installed in this splendid acquisition, but he left a son, Henry VI., who inherited his claims, and though only a child, was acknowledged as king by the greater part of France, and crowned in Paris. This event gave the English a much more extended footing in France than they ever had before. In point of fact, with the exception of certain provinces under independent dukes and counts, they had a complete mastery in the country, and the sovereigns were henceforth styled kings of France and England. What, it may be asked, were the feelings of the French people on finding themselves so coolly handed over to a foreign power? At the time we speak of, the people at large were for the greater part serfs or bondsmen, under powerful nobles, and to them one king was generally as good as another. Their occasional oppression under these feudal chiefs was their principal grievance, and sometimes they arose in immense numbers and slew the nobility and their families. A dreadful outburst of this nature occurred about the year 1358, and is known in history as the revolt of the Jacquerie. Sometimes much blood was also shed by the contentions of rival dukes, each bringing his vassals into the field to fight against the other. A fierce civil war of this kind took place a short time previous to the accession of Henry VI.

This young king being incapable of ruling in his own person, his government in France was conducted by the Dukes of Bedford and Gloucester. These noblemen had a difficult part to act; for Charles, the Dauphin, or son of the late king of France, had a party in the state who favoured his preferable claims to the throne; and, besides, the civil broils among the noblesse and peasantry kept everything unsettled. The English power, fortified by the Duke of Burgundy, was, however, supreme. All the towns and forts were garrisoned with English soldiers; and it is not unlikely that, with prudent management, and with a popular monarch, France would have irrevocably become a province of England.

Such a misfortune for both countries was prevented in a most singular manner by the intrepidity of a peasant-girl; and it is the story of this girl that we now propose to tell, and we tell it to the shame of the English nation—the shame of bigotry-the shame of having cruelly maltreated an innocent and patriotic maiden.

EARLY LIFE OF JOAN OF ARC.

Jeanne Darc, or, as we translate the name, Joan of Arc, was born in the year 1412. Her parents-Jacques Darc, and his wife Isabelle —were cottagers, who dwelt in Domremy, a village on the borders of Lorraine, in the north-eastern part of France. Joan had a sister who died young, and three brothers, who lived to reap advantages

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